


All These Sacred Boundaries

by paperiuni



Series: Unwritten: Codas & Interludes [4]
Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Bittersweet, Episode Tag, Fluff and Angst, Future Fic, M/M, Post-Episode: s03e05: Stronger Than Heaven
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-19
Updated: 2018-04-19
Packaged: 2019-04-24 21:54:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14364501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paperiuni/pseuds/paperiuni
Summary: Alec's entire attention is bent to the box. Before Magnus can decide between umbrage or a gentler opening, Alec says, hushed, "I really wish I could talk to you, sometimes."Alec takes the box out again, for a very different purpose. (A distant coda for 3.05.)





	All These Sacred Boundaries

A couple of years later, on a soft spring day, Magnus comes home to the immediate sense that something's amiss.

Alec is there: the bow and quiver in the doorside rack give up his presence. The wards are still and smooth, undisturbed. Sunlight pours in hazy patterns onto the floor, dust motes drowsy in the air.

He follows the feeling to the study, not quite sure why he doesn't just call out to Alec.

Here, then, is a sight.

Alec sits cross-legged on the floor, in worn jeans and the old gray tee-shirt, his feet bare. The light dawdles in the dark of his hair, falling into his eyes. Books surround him like a peculiar summoning circle, some turned open, others marked with slips of paper torn from his notebook.

He's not looking at a book. His right hand, sure and dear, rests on the closed lid of the box he once opened without leave. Magnus had left it, almost spitefully, in the bookshelf. As a barbed reminder that he'd know if it was touched again. Alec never commented on it—which, with the grace of hindsight, shouldn't surprise Magnus at all. He most likely thought it a deserved reprimand.

Alec's entire attention is bent to the box. Before Magnus can decide between umbrage or a gentler opening, Alec says, hushed, "I really wish I could talk to you, sometimes."

He traces some detail of the wood inlay on the lid with a finger. Magnus finds himself _not_ stepping forward to stop him.

"I don't even know your names. Most of you anyway. And sometimes I—" The quality of Alec's sigh is unmistakable; he's recognizing a truth that stings. "No. I don't ever hate that you existed. Maybe I just hate that it makes me feel so—redundant."

The word is a rebuke, aimed at Alec himself. He curls around it a notch as if in defense. As quietly as he can, Magnus sidles next to the nearest column, a sudden intruder in his own home.

In both their home. That is different from the previous time.

"I know that's selfish, too. I mean, maybe it'd be different if I'd had somebody before him. I'd have a comparison." Alec rakes his hand through his hair. "But that's not the point. The point is, if I could say anything to any of you—"

Muffling a breath into his palm, Magnus curses himself for not calling out. Stares at Alec's bowed head, at the tremulous arch of his shoulders, at the stroke of his fingers over the lid, cautious and reverent. Whatever harshness there is in him is reserved for himself.

"Thank you," Alec says then, so low it's only a rasp of air. "It took me a while, but—thank you. For loving him while you could. For bringing him to me. I'm trying to be good to him. I promise."

Here, then, is a truth: love isn't a quantifiable force, but Magnus has never felt it like he does in that moment, bittersweet and overwhelming. Alec rises and tucks the box back where it's sat for the last years. His hands linger.

Magnus can't take it. His next movement will shatter the illusion, will tell Alec that he's not alone with the silent ghosts locked in that box. It is a sin of some kind he never told Alec their names. He meant that ignorance as kindness to Alec, as protection for himself. Now, it's neither.

Because Alec is right. Because how else would he be here, now, if they hadn't loved him? If they hadn't held him fast to the world, opened his eyes to things he only thought he knew in full? If they hadn't done all that and more, as Alec does every day.

Magnus watches Alec stand and take a breath, deep and steady, bracing for a conflict. The corners of his eyes burn.

Then Alec's shoulders fall. Their line goes loose. "Okay. Do you want to have an argument, or can we just—"

Oh, but Magnus deserves that, for trying to sneak up on a Shadowhunter, least of all this one. He gets out a tattered laugh. "If we could just move on to the part where I get to hold you, that would be fine."

Alec turns to him, and holds out his arms.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from the inimitable Vienna Teng.
> 
> I am on [tumblr](https://poemsfromthealley.tumblr.com/)!


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